I got a lot of people saying that boxers are getting paid very well especaily elite fighers but this is not 100% in my opinion. I you look at a fight like Julio Cesar Martinez vs Jay harris. two very elite fighers who fought for the flyweight WBC championship. Julio Cesar Martinez held the WBC belt and with a record of 16-1 and jay harris the EBU champion with a record of 17-0 it was a very great and competive fight but in the end Martinez took home the win. (link to the fight: This content is protected ) The thing is that in my opinion they got paid very little Martinez took home 75,000 dollar and harris 25,000 dollar. I mean both guys were great fighers with good records and it was a equal fight for the WBC belt which many people reconize as the most important belt and it was a glamour divison. I mean wtf is 25k you almost keep nothing after expenses. What do you guys think?
Certainly anything below ‘elite’ level are criminally underpaid but that’s the market. Unfortunately it’s a niche sport. The elite i.e. the 0.01% are paid handsomely (and rightly so).
Well at first very big difference is this question: said purse is take home after all expenses and taxes paid off? This might include: sparring partners paychecks and living expenses plus nutrition if they should travel to your city to do pre fight or simple training camp with you. Handlers here. Team: coach, cutman, ofc also if you use: massage, S/C trainer, sports doctor, physiotherapist. Insurance. Travel expenses. Managers, agent's, boxer's promoters % and/ or fees. Taxman like in all businesses and paid jobs. % how much from remaining will take taxman depends from country and your accountant, tax advisor ( these too are paid by you ). Remaining yeah, will be your real take home. Purses for fight might be different and these depends from damn a lot of variables in the game. Of course also from ranking, belts, resume in ams and pros, how well known boxer is, how watchable he is, does promoter have increase in tickets sales if he does have you on card and further. Big variable is how you are able to negotiate. Not lesser than from mentioned variables. A lot boxers are working, also in gyms and other jobs until they are enough well known and highly ranked to afford to be 100% pro boxers. Some are sponsored by someone. Well known boxers earns a lot. I you are beginner there, you need to worry about record and especially ranking and how watchable you are. Not about money. After some fights you will get why. If you are some am superstar promoters and managers are offering sign up bonuses.
More or less. 2 lads had fought just to fill time in event ( this is if promoter adds some cards in event to prolong show and does not have A and B side lads there , just random fight on card, promoter doesn't cares who will win ). Both of them had get each 400 eur. Both were pro debut lads. The funniest thing that one from these lads was future world champion. Imagine how cool might be debut fight and this in country not so poor by EU standards. If they had skills to negotiate purse, they had more cos both of them had also sold a bit tickets. Of course when lad is more well known at least locally he might get more. Debut fights maybe from 100 till 3000 like this. Might be 800-1000. 4 rounder. Might be more. EU. Not rare cases is better to fight vs absolute no hoper for small purse than vs maybe better than you lad. One lad had pro record like 5-0 and not bad ranking. They decided gave him another local lad to fight with. Tickets sales considerably better, both local lads ). Now listen: boxer's gym had underestimated supposed opponent while boxer's manager warned that debut lad hits body like a truck. Gym and lad had agreed to schedule 6 rounds fight, manager at least was successful to negotiate 4 rounder instead of this. Prospect had won this one on cards. Supposed by gym easy opponent ( 5-0-0 lad vs 0-0-0 debut guy ) was more torture for lad than all previous fights together. Boxer was not elite, big luck that did not had good skills to punch head. He beated his ribs with force like real title cotender should have. For low purse ofc. Good that he did not had landed proper liver punch. Guy looked half alive after this more than 3 weeks, while he had won this fight. If he had scheduled 6 rounder, he had lost this fight via TKO. vs debut lad.
The lower weight divisions always struggle. They're making less than HW journeymen. In this time when gate revenue is so low, I'm surprised the difference hasn't closed a little. Small guys look weird in person but on TV it's all roughly the same, or better really since they are so active.
Not compared to MMA fighters The distribution for us is a little top heavy, but our top end is YUGE! Big bucks baby! & our top dogs pay good money for sparring partners who are typically younger up and comers. Sport is hard, earning money through sport is even harder.
Yourneyman purse too depends from the same bunch with different variables. I think depends also from country. Ofc from opponent too there too bunch with variables. Low ranked lads in europe does not earn much even in HW unless they are supposed prospects or damn, depends from so much variables. Highly ranked HW boxers for sure gets more than smaller lads. TOP 100, TOP 50, TOP25, TOP15 ofc. It depends. If you want to get well known in your city no hoper with awful record or something better. Definition of journeyman is very wide. Some might be like guys who even does not train anymore, not dangerous, coming for paycheck only. Some might be very dangerous and spark prospect, tickets seller out cold if they will manage to land properly.
Depends on the elite boxer guys like Canelo and AJ clearly make good money and are probably smart enough to minimise their costs and minimise their tax liabilities or at least you'd hope so. I'm sure plenty of world champions in the lower weights are not making great money considering the risk and effort they put in. I remember when In Jin Chi was WBC champion he quit because he wasn't making enough in S.Korea so switched to kickboxing.
Well you do not need to be elite boxer. You might made a lot money with your pro debut fight if you are well known. Like Askern and YT lad and this Conor had already proved. Canelo is conidered as elite because he did had clauses, fights in Nevada etc miracles. If Canelo was traveling around the world boxer, he had already enough L on his record. It is what it is here. He is very good but not so good as ppl think. Catchweight, clauses, hometown fights, cherry picking.
He needs a new promoter. Don King paid Rosendo Alvarez $265,000 to challenge Ricardo Lopez in Mexico. And, according to Alvarez, the money was "tax free." (King paid him in cash) That was in 1998. Not 2021.
